Aibu to think rape is not merely about power and sometimes is just about sex?

[CheeseBubbles]

I see it said a lot and I'm not convinced. If rape is solely about power there's no point teaching men about consent is there? If anything they might use the knowledge to better abuse their victims. Isn't it possible that for some men they simply want sex and don't actually give a shit one way or another what the victim is thinking. On the relationship board you'll see men who try it on nicely at first and then move on to coercion which makes me think again that this is just sex for them because they'd happily get it the easy way if possible. I don't know if it really makes a difference but I worry that if we assign this one motivation to it we draw a line that doesn't really need to be there and maybe make men who used garden variety coercion or a really drunk woman to think they didn't actually rape, because for them it wasn't a power trip.

That poster appears to be quite an odd individual, especially cropping up on a thread about rape purely to make that comment.

If I remember right That poster always pops up whenever Ched is mentioned.

I have 2 DS, they are 12 & 10.
I have already started conversations about consent.

Rape is always about power, as it is disregarding another human being's wishes because you feel your needs are more improbably. You can do this because you are stronger.

More important

In his witness account Ched Evans said that the complainant enthusiastically consented.

Of course, because it was his word against hers and he was going to get done for rape. That doesn't mean he's not lying.

He may well have lied. But the complainant said she couldn't remember the incident. So who said that he didn't talk to her ? I can't recall now what the original co-defendant said.

This thread isn't about a specific case. That poster seems quite obsessed with it and keen to divert the discussion though.

I'm a sufferer of an attack many moons ago as a child.
I'm common as muck ( ) so excuse the lack of correct terminology; the only way I can try and digest it is that the abuser shows intent, their advance gets rejected, embarrassment/frustration for abuser "how dare they refuse me" harder show of intent (be it coercion or otherwise) and finally attack.
It may not start as a power trip but what they resort to and the journey to the attack is.
Sorry if I'm on the wrong track here.

Bastard, sorry to hear about your experience.

I think that any time one human attempts to exert their will over another's to that person's detriment, it's about power. They may not obviously be thinking 'hey, I'm on a power trip' but that is what they're doing.

To take another example: a teacher wants a pupil to sit down and be quiet. (I'm a teacher, so this isn't a teacher bashing example). They have a certain amount of power over that child because of the teacher/pupil scenario. A bit like men have more power than women, so it's easier to exert their control.

The act of making a child sit quietly is not a bad thing, and can be a good thing (just like sex) but there can be times when it's not the right thing, or the teacher does it in a wrong way, or even when the teacher is doing it just to prove that they have the power to, and they even embarrass the pupil in how they do it. BUT - in many, many of the possible ways that a teacher can make a pupil sit down, the only one which engages the pupil respectfully and includes consent is the teacher saying "would you like to sit down?" and the pupil saying "yes". It is ONLY if the pupil gives consent that it isn't some tacit display of the power differential between teacher and pupil. When the teacher actually engages with the pupil, and asks, and listens to the pupil's response, it isn't about a power play.
That's what we need to teach about consent. Any person who has more power/authority than another, and just carelessly assumes that then can exert it, no matter how much they do so gently, is in a power play situation.

I don't want to derail the thread to focus on Ched Evans case, but it's being used here as a case that highlights so called problems or misunderstandings of consent (like the current thread about Bill Crosby). In the transcript X was reported to have said "fuck me harder".
If there's potential for what I'm loathed to refer to as mixed messages regarding consent, then there's an understanding that there's power play going on.

In the NHS, patients have to give informed consent to essentially give up some of their autonomy - i.e. be made vulnerable by taking their clothes off or being held unconscious for surgery. I don't fill in the blanks or infer things from patients because I recognise that 1. they have personhood and 2. are particularly vulnerable in that setting. We used to just "I won't understand Dr, you know best just do whatever". That's not good enough.

Men aren't upholding those above principles when they take a woman who is drunk back to a premier inn, tell their friends to join them, leaving her with your friend whilst telling the night clerk on the way out look out for her as she's too pissed and unwell.

BastardBernie sorry to hear about what happened. You articulate very well the mindset in such attacks. I think the power is always there and the abuser is always aware of the power they hold; the choice to carry out the attack is a choice to exert that power.

The process reminds me of the frustration of a child denied a packet of sweets, followed by disbelief, a sulk, wheedling and an epic tantrum. Its one good reason to teach small children delayed gratification and self soothing.

Yes I agree bastardbernie well put

I understand the point you are making OP in that the men themselves might not think its about power, but by choosing to do it they are exerting power. So even if their motivation was sexual, the act itself is an act of power and assertion. Power which the victim doesn't have but they do.

I think that many rapists conflate power with force. They don't use physical force, so it wasn't an abuse of power, therefore couldn't have been rape.

If they want sex, and have the power/influence to access it then it's OK. They don't need consent, they just need the authority (channel Carter from South Park). A woman is beneath them, and therefore they have the power/right etc. BUt if they're so blind to the privilege they have that they refuse to admit to having that kind of power/control, then they never have to admit that they abused it, therefore they didn't rape.

It's a twisted form of logic which denies the truth that men have many forms of power over women, and pretends that they are equals and it was an act of equal consent.

The way to teach against it is to a) insist that consent is needed, because b) women are just as much people as men are.

Sadly, many men just think that because it was fun for them, it was fun for the woman as well.

Some rape is about sex and not about power and this is where understanding consent comes into play. When a couple are getting into the mood and sex is either about to happen or is already happening and the women decides she doesn't want to go ahead or continue and the man ignores her and finishes. This could be in a marriage, fwb situation or during dating / ons. The man is ignoring their partners wishes to fulfil their sexual needs.

That is still about power. Anyone who ignores their partner's sovereign right to consent to sex is exerting power. It's entitlement, and entitlement only comes with power.

Some rape is mostly about power, some is more about gratifying the sexual urge of the rapist. But they have still ignored the feelings of another human being because they feel their desire is more important, without any concern for their psychological and often physical pain and suffering. That is power. Plenty of rapes are about both power and sex but rape is always an act of dominance.

If two people make the opposite choice and one forcibly gets their way, then they abused power to do that.

If one person wants to stop halfway through the other can choose to finish alone.

YY DJ.

YANBU.
Sometimes rape is about power and sadism. And the power is the focus, not the sexual act - they find the power/sadism itself to be sexually arousing. Hurting someone by violating them and having power over them is what gets them off, sexually.

Sometimes rape is about entitlement and sex. About a man thinking they shouldn't have to masturbate, because they are entitled to actual sex and shouldn't have to have the 'second best' of masturbation. There's an element of power (because entitlement and power are linked,) yes, but their focus is the sex act, not the power they use to force that sex act.

Personally I think describing all rape as being about power, is rather like saying all child abusers are pedophiles.
It's untrue, and it frames the issue in a very starkly black and white way, which can make people disbelieve victims' disclosures, and even victims disbelieve themselves.
There are multiple reasons why people abuse - power is what makes it possible, yes, but it is often not a motivating factor.

Entitlement is an expression of power. The powerless feel a sense of injustice. Emotionally immature men lash out at a substitute instead of the person they are angry at, and thats how anger rapes happen.

If the victim had power, they wouldnt be raped.

I think all this "ooh you can't say all rape is about power" is meaningless semantics. As DJ says power is inherent in the act of rape.

With regard to teaching men about consent ... doing so will not prevent them from raping.
What we need to teach men is to ask explicitly, and wait for a yes. If we can establish this as the normal, the rapists won't be able to hide behind "Oh, but I thought she wanted it".
That might, just might, result in more convictions, and in women being better able to get away from rapists they are in relationships with.

If we want to reduce the number of rapists ... we'd completely change everything about society.

Make boys read books by women and about women's lives in school instead of books by long-dead men.
Cut off boys' access to porn completely.
Perhaps have obligatory lessons in empathy, with a focus on empathy with women.

In short, teach boys that women are human and prevent them from learning the exact opposite from porn.

The problem is not that men cannot recognize a soft no when they see one. They are very well able to do so in all contexts.
The problem is that they don't see women as truly human.

hink all this "ooh you can't say all rape is about power" is meaningless semantics. As DJ says power is inherent in the act of rape.

Meaningless semantics is used to dismiss lots of feminists arguments. And if it was meaningless posters wouldn't be arguing I'm wrong. . I don't think it is meaningless, I don't think I'm going to come around to the general way of thinking and I dont expect anyone else (bar scrumplstikston) is going to agree with me which is fine, but I have explained my problems with the idea and where I think it can cause issues

To say rape is about "sex" you need to have a fucking dismal view of what sex actually is.

Sex is not a man forcing his penis into an unwilling woman's vagina.
Sex is not a man masturbating himself inside a vagina while the owner of that vagina lies there limply, disempowered, being violated.

Sex is a mutual act between two people with enthusiastic consent.

Rape is a man violating a woman's body with his genitals, it is not "sex".

Alpaca rape is t always like that, it's not always a woman fighting a man off though. This is my point. That's a rape myth. Sometimes it's just a woman's going along with it because she'll not have a miserable husband for a week. And a man who thinks she'll get in to it once she's started.

That's why I think it trying to pin a specific psychological intent isn't helpful.

Less porn, teach consent, teach boys and girls that women are people and should like sex as much as men